Useful tool for students to gain insight into specific pieces of artwork

If I am going to talk about art (which I do), then I want my students to be able to see it. Here they can see it and learn about it from experts.

The videos and pictures from ancient Roman art history were wonderfully informative and well done. My students got a great overview of the city with the video reconstructions of ancient buildings in the video on the main page. Several of them wanted to explore further, but we ran out of time!

From the KahnAcademy, SmartHistory has been called “the art history textbook of the future.” This multimedia look at art and art history contains nearly 500 videos and 250 essays. Within this sleek looking site, you can search by time, style, artist, theme, or you can use the visual timeline search tool. In addition to each essay or video, each result provides a map to show where the artist or painting in question originated from, as well as useful related links. Some of these links were traditional and pointed to art museums, but some went to sites such as amazing flickr accounts that were filled with pictures contributed by hundreds of users showing the artist’s work. There is also the ability to comment on each of the articles and videos and the discussions are surprisingly very thoughtful and so it might be a great time to practice collaboration and digital citizenship.